Mothership Ableton Template

The Mothership: Where Do I Start?

First, know your music. Whatever genres you listen to, get to know what it has and needs. If you read this blog regularly, you know that I always insist on knowing and using references. The mothership method also starts with references. There are a few essential questions you need to ask yourself when you listen to your references:

• What are the predominant sounds? For instance, in techno, the kick, hats, and snare are always there and for most of the song's duration. There are percussion and effects often, but they're not the main players.
• What is the melody composed of? Is the melody only one sound (ex. synth) or 2-3 different sounds talking to each other?
• Is there more to it? Sometimes, we can get lost in a reference track as there seems to be a lot going on, perhaps little sounds in the background or swirling swooshes. Those are what I call distractions. If you want to analyze a song truly, make a 2-bar loop right in the middle part or when the song is at its busiest, then start counting each sound and make sense of what you hear.

Once your song has been analyzed, you're ready to build a template.

Read the full article about it and see why I've been using this technique with people I coach.